So-called “mainstream” anti-abortion activists have taken pains to distance themselves from the murder of Kansas Dr. George Tiller, assassinated outside his church yesterday morning. The suspect, Scott Roeder, was a member of the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue, whose leader, Troy Newman, issued a statement declaring himself “shocked” at Dr. Tiller’s murder yesterday. (The group’s former leader, Randall Terry, used the occasion to again call Tiller a “murderer” killed because he violated the “Law of God.”) Newman added that the group “has worked for years through peaceful, legal means, and through the proper channels to see [Tiller] brought to justice. We denounce vigilantism and the cowardly act that took place this morning.” Meanwhile, officials called the murder “the act of an isolated individual,” and President Obama said in a statement, “However profound our differences as Americans over difficult issues such as abortion, they cannot be resolved by heinous acts of violence.”
The problem with statements like Obama’s is that they presume each side is equally responsible for the contentiousness of the abortion “debate”—that the belief that women have a right to take part in a legal medical procedure without threats and intimidation is somehow equivalent to the belief that women should be forced to carry every child to term, even if it kills them. Or, put another way, that supporting judges and elected officials who are pro-choice is the moral equivalent of standing outside a clinic and screaming at every woman who enters. Killing doctors is only the logical conclusion of a movement whose primary currency is intimidation. No other activist movement in this nation relies so heavily on the implicit threat of physical violence to get its way. And if you believe, as anti-abortion extremists do, that abortion is “murder,” then murdering in retaliation makes perfect sense. An eye for an eye.
Those of us who are pro-choice—and I include in that group all shades of pro-choicers, from those who believe abortion is morally fraught to those who support the liberalization of abortion laws— will never find “common ground” with those who are anti-choice, because there is no common ground. On one side, we have those who want to protect women’s right to obtain a legal medical procedure; on the other, we have those who think abortion is murder and will use any means necessary to prevent women from obtaining one (even while they fight against measures, like accurate sex education and emergency contraception, that would make abortion less common). On one side, we have those who believe in women’s right to determine their own destiny; on the other, we have those who believe women should cede control of our bodies to the state. On one side, we have those who attempt to protect women’s access to abortion by supporting pro-choice judges and elected officials; on the other, we have those who use violence and the threat of violence to intimidate women and abortion providers. Tell me, where is the common ground between those two groups?
So no, President Obama, those who believe in a woman’s right to choose should not “open our hearts and minds to those who may not think like we do.” Because “common ground,” in this case, is code for ceding away our rights— women’s rights—in the interest of calming a storm we didn’t create. And because you don’t negotiate with terrorists—whether they’re threatening doctors or taking hostages.
Obama declared himself “shocked” by Tiller’s murder. But why? Tiller had been shot before. For years, he had worn a bullet-proof vest, driven an armored car, and protected himself with security guards. As Jill Filipovic notes, anti-abortion activists had harassed his patients, bombed his clinic, and published his address and the addresses of everyone who did business with him. So why should anyone profess surprise when one took those actions to their logical conclusion?
Tiller provided abortions past 21 weeks, to women whose pregnancies had gone tragically, life-threateningly wrong. They were women, as Lynn Paltrow notes, with wanted pregnancies “who learned that their baby had no brain, or kidneys growing on the outside of their bodies or things their doctors described to them as ‘severe fetal cardiac malformations.'” They were rape victims as young as 10 or 11, some of them too young to even realize they had had periods. For these women and girls, Tiller was a godsend. His death leaves the US with just two doctors willing to perform late-term therapeutic abortions—and a medical community in which providing late-term abortions will be seen, rightly, as increasingly dangerous. And who can blame them? Terrorism works. Its means is intimidation—don’t go into the clinic or you’ll be harassed and threatened, don’t provide abortions or we’ll harass your family, don’t provide late-term abortions or you’ll be killed. In the battle to eliminate women’s right to abortion, the terrorists are—undeniably—winning.
Washington State pro-choice groups are holding a candlelight vigil in Cal Anderson Park, 635 11th Ave, at 6:00 tonight. NARAL Pro-Choice Washington is Twittering updates here.
Erica,
I can appreciate your anger. I, too acknowledged Dr. Tiller in a private email to a friend. He didn’t need to die.
But, I’m a reluctant pro-choicer (“It should be safe, legal & rare”). Dr. Tiller performed a procedure bordering on infantcide (one can argue). That does not make him a target for muder. I agree with what one Slogger said and I’m paraphrasing “I have an easier time with the procedure if the pregnancy was 3 months or under. At 3-6 months it’s very murky and at 6-9 months greatly discouraged unless the life (vs. health) of the woman is at stake.” If a woman has more than one (abortion) during her child bearing years, I begin to question her psyche.
Much is being made of the coverage of his murder. I like what these two articles have to say to keep it in perspective:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/article…
&
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB12439869…
I disagree with you Erica. There must be some dialogue and some common ground.
People who say “well, it’s murder, but it’s ok if the woman was raped…” are people who, basically, have just disregarded their own argument. If the fetus counts as a person, it counts as a person, even if it was a product of rape. Here, you’re showing you think of the fetus as something less, because the woman is a rape victim, rather than simply a hetero or bisexual woman who enjoyed consensual sex (“that whore!”).
Really, all you’re saying is “the woman is a victim, so fuck the fetus” where if she had sex with some guy by choice, then “the fetus is a victim, so fuck the woman.”
This is about shaming “the whore” and you fucking know it. Liars.
What a fitting number for your post, 101. You present yourself as the voice of reason here, so please, share with the rest of us. Now that Dr. Tiller is dead, and you, the “one”, claim his work was close to infanticide, didn’t you know he had the balls to take on the really tough cases of women whose pregnancies had seriously gone wrong? How are you qualified to “greatly discourage” them from having abortions and question their better judgment? Is their something the rest of us should know about you? And what are you personally willing to sacrifice in order to “greatly discourage” the difficult and private decisions of others? Now come up with something tangible, not just nice ideas in your head, through your fingers and then onto a blog, but something that really means something to you. Are you and your ilk solely going to fund these women through their life time of health problems? Are you going to pay to keep a brain dead baby alive on life support for x number of years? Are you going to have a child yourself and give it to one of these women because your “better judgment” “greatly discouraged” hers and rendered her infertile? If you want the right to “greatly discourage” that which is none of your business, seriously, what are you personally willing to give up to claim that right?
So often those who present themselves as the voice of reason are often just ignorant and arrogant.
@ 103,
Nice touch. I don’t claim the “voice of reason” . But you are partly correct. I’m not ignorant just arrogant. Australian ethicist Dr. Peter Singer once argued for infantcide for babies deemed so deformed that “why not throw them away?” like over a cliff or down a well once born. After all, that was once done. And, a mere few days (hours?) separate a late 3rd trimester abortion and well… infantcide.
Look, I don’t have a uterus and I may not know enough about the intense personal decision a woman may have to make at that stage of pregnancy but I didn’t say “forbid”. I did say “greatly discourage”.
Last time I checked, we are trying to discourage “unnecessary abortions” whatever that might mean. Your ignorance & arrogance don’t help.
Quite a few people have said something along the lines of ‘it’s awful when abortions are used as birth control’ or ‘they should be available, but obviously we want as few as possible’. Why? Surely, if there’s no moral problem with abortion, you should be able to have as many as you want, and not worry about it any more than you’d worry about the hairs that die after you shave your legs?
This is one real contradiction I’ve seen in the pro-choice philosophy. Why is it expected that women will feel conflicted, agonised, guilty and sad, if there’s nothing wrong with it?
Also, to the people who are arguing that having sex = making the choice to get pregnant. Logic fail. Choosing to get pregnant = the choice to get pregnant. Anything else is an accident. You might take it as a pleasant surprise or end it as quickly as possible, but you didn’t consent to it – not even implicitly, sex does *not* automatically lead to pregnancy, and shouldn’t be treated as though it does – and you’re under no obligation to maintain it.
@105 I like your logic.
I am actually far more interested in a decrease in the number accidental pregnancies/unwanted children in this world than decreasing the number of abortions. It is sick how many people have children and yet have no interest in caring for them. People who rely on the state or who have children explicitly to get support from the state. Teenage mothers popping up left and right because they are taught to feel shameful at the idea of getting an abortion, but are too selfish to see that at 14 they are unfit to be parents themselves.
If our government wants to focus on increasing sex education and making birth control more readily available, then sweet, I’m all for it. But leave abortion out of the argument. Unfortunately finding the # of unwanted children born of accidental pregnancy vs. the # of abortions from an unwanted pregnancy is probably not an easy statistic to find, as I am sure people rarely admit that they don’t want their child no matter what their actions say. But I have a feeling that people are focusing on the wrong “evil” in this whole damned thing.
Oh 101, you’ve moved up to 104 – How impressive. You speak out of both sides of your mouth with amazing ignorance and arrogance. Dr Tiller cannot be compared to Pete Singer. Born babies are not within the body of a suffering person. What a stupid analogy. So you acknowledged Dr. Tiller in a private email, how useless. You talk about him as a baby killer and basically rationalize his murder. Dr Tiller was one of the few doctors willing to take on extremely tough cases that people like you can’t even imagine and would never have the balls to deal with. Now, in your arrogance and ignorance, you forgot to mention what the hell are you willing to sacrifice?